Google introduces an AD Blocker in Chrome

Ads that suddenly appear and occupy the entire page, videos that you cannot close, an animation that prevents you from seeing the screen, music that you do not know where it comes from ... How annoying Google Chrome ads can be. Luckily, they have their days numbered.

The company has added an ad blocker that will hide the most intrusive advertising, the one that prevents the user from continuing to use the browser normally, both on computers and mobile phones.

This new strategy, announced in June by Google, is the result of a pact of the Coalition for Better Ads, formed by companies from various sectors such as Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Unilever or the Washington Post. The coalition has developed a list of requirements that online advertising must meet.

Ads that do not meet the requirements will be filtered and hidden. Some examples of advertising not allowed according to the coalition are one that appears in pop-up windows, makes noise, does not allow to see the screen or cannot be closed.

The blocker has come online this week, but Google will give 30 days to the owners of the pages that do not comply with the new regulations to change the type of advertising. Chrome will warn users when they are on a page with blocked ads and give them the opportunity to unblock them if they prefer.

The fact that Google decides which ads are acceptable and which has not angered some users, who accuse the company of being too permissive for not blocking all advertising. For now, only nine types of ads are classified as intrusive, out of a total of more than fifty.

Some users accuse Google of having too much weight in the Coalition for Better Ads and favoring their interests

Although Google's main revenue stream is advertising, the company has been pressured to introduce this intrusive ad blocking system. More than 10% of users already use extensions for Chrome for the same purpose, but external blockers are also more extensive.

Google considers that these increasingly common external blockers are unfair, as they harm companies that do not violate the intrusive advertising requirements. The Google program allows more publicity than external blockers, so ultimately it favors their interests.